Hide & Seek
by Somebody Once
Summary: Umut may be dying, Sarp may be falling apart. I needed to see what happened between the boys being shot in the warehouse till the Ceremony. This is an attempt to fill in the gaps. It'll be multiple chapters.
1. Chapter 1

It's dark and the gunshots echo and then all Umut knows is the echoing of silence. He's vaguely aware of voices, more gun fire, yells to 'drop your weapon now'. He'd assume it might be the police if he didn't have zero faith in that department. Zero faith in anyone but his 'Abi' anyway. Speaking of…Sarp's silent. His voice isn't one that rings out and Umut shudders. He can feel the blood spilling out of him and he shakes violently, he's not sure if it's shock or fear for his brother. Who shot who? Is Sarp alive? Sarp needs to be alive.

He tries to open his eyes but his eyelids are too heavy, thick and weighed down. He's shaking, he feels hot and cold all at once and he wants his big brother. Are they really destined to die here? While Celal, the monster walks free? While his mother potentially mourns two sons. One she only just found again. It's not fair. But then when has Umut's life ever been fair?

It's strange thinking of himself as Umut now. He's been Mert Karadag since he was old enough to choose his name. 'Mert Karadag' It sounded strong, independent, fierce, uncomplicated. It was a front. A front to make him sound and act and feel stronger on the streets. Aging himself came hand in hand. People were less likely to abuse an older kid, it was a street fact and one Mert had learned quickly for self preservation. Survival was the key, survival was always the key. Keep people away, don't get too close, don't get attached. Survive.

He was a scared, lonely, complicated child and Mert Karadag sounded like the opposite of that. Mert Karadag was the illusion he'd lived with his whole life and now it felt like Met and Umut, his very own Jekyll and Hyde were warring within him. Mert wanted to survive, HAD to survive. Umut wanted his brother. Neither were currently getting what they wanted.

More gunfire. He feels tired. Bone tired from the tips of his fingers to his toes. It would be easy to fall asleep. To let himself go. His inner Mert is screaming, his inner Umut just wants rest. 'Abi' he whispers thinking of his brother. Of the wasted opportunities but mostly he thinks of the joy, of the absolute feeling of completeness when he was back in his arms, under his watch. 'I won't let them take your Umut away again', that's what he'd told his brother. Because he was, wasn't he? Sarp's Umut mainly? He belonged to his brother in a way he had never belonged to anyone before. He adored Eylem she completed him, she filled parts of his heart he thought he'd never be able to fill but Sarp, Sarp was different.

Long before he'd known he was Umut he'd known the depth of Sarp's endless devotion to his lost brother, to the forever missing child. He'd hated Sarp then but that, that was one of the things he'd respected. Perhaps the biggest thing. 'Open your eyes Abi, no more hide and seek.' He was so sick of playing that 20 year game. He'd been hiding most of his life now they'd finally found one another. He'd needed Sarp to pull the trigger, needed him to stop that threat to his life. Not for himself, he was pretty sure he wasn't making it out of this but for Sarp. He couldn't live with them getting away again, with the hide and seek taunting and tormenting him for another 20 years. Sarp deserved peace. Even with Umut dead, he deserved them gone. Blown off the face of the planet.

There's a lull in the gunfire. Umut tries to roll himself over, to move a hand, to do anything but all that comes out is a weak moan. 'S…Sarp' he manages.

And then there's a flutter by his ear, a movement, a shuffle. And then there's a hand on his face, in his hair, 'Umut, Umut I'm here…it's ok, it's ok, I'm here. Open your eyes for me kardesim. Open them.'

His Abi. His Abi is here, and alive. His breaths are short and huffs and Umut imagines he's in a great deal of pain, maybe they both are dying here. Umut wants to open his eyes, he really wants to but he still can't manage it. 'Abi…' he breathes and then he coughs and he can taste the tangy metal of blood in his mouth, feels it fall down his chin. Oh god. He's bleeding out.

'Kardesim, I'm here, I'm here little brother. You're ok, you're going to be fine. I promise, I promise you Umut.'

Sarp's voice is husky, panicked, attempting to be reassuring, the wobble in his voice the only thing that betrays the total fear he's feeling. He feels hands stroking his cheek and then he's being jostled and he whites out in pain. He must scream because Sarp's apologising then, over and over and he realises he's in his brother's lap now that Sarp is cradling him. He wills any strength he has left to his eyelids and slowly, slowly, he opens them. Sarp is staring down at him, wide eyed, blood on his face, pale and white and the most beautiful thing Umut has ever seen in his life. 'There you are' Sarp whispers. The gun shots echo on behind him.

'Let me tell you a story Umut…there were two brothers right..' he strokes Umut's face. It feels nice. 'And these two brothers encountered a monster in the forest…' there's a part of Umut that recognises this. Somewhere in the back of his mind he knows this. 'And the monster took the little boys big brother…' No he thinks. No he can't. And then Sarp's eyes dart away from his, his voice breaks off 'IN HERE!' He screams 'WE NEED HELP! HE NEEDS HELP. HELP!'

And Mert feels the energy fading. Feels his body shutting down. 'What happened Abi?' he spits, the blood making its way down his chin with a vengeance. Sarp looks down in total fear now. He thumbs the blood away from Umut's mouth.

'Huh?'

'Did they kill the monster…Did they kill it?'

'Of course they did little brother'. He says softly, so softly now. And there are people behind him now, behind his brother, blurry shapes and shouts and there are hands on him but he keeps his eyes on Sarp's face. Sarp is yelling and screaming and he can hear his name over and over. And Umut is choking. He's choking. Sarp's hands are on his face, tilting him, trying to stop him choking on his own blood. 'You found me Abi', Umut manages between coughs 'no more hide and seek'.

'No more hide and seek' Sarp promises and then everything goes mercifully black.


	2. Chapter 2

Authors Note: For Milena because she bribed me haha and I love her and my Icerde girls on twitter.

Umut's hurt. They made his little brother bleed. It's all Sarp can think about and he's overcome with the sort of rage that he simply can not control. The rage that can only be brought on by a threat to his kardesim. He'd felt it when he'd faced off with Davut. The utter terror, the sheer physical inability to breathe for a second.

 _'_ _You won't see your brother again Sarp, my father Celal will cut him up into pieces. You won't see a single part of him.'_

The image of Celal with a knife, a cleaver, attacking his baby brother had ripped through him creeping into horrifying parts of his mind that he never wanted to visit. He would not let that happen. He would die before he touched Umut again.

Umut was his greatest weakness, had been his entire life and he'd do anything, he'd be anything if it meant his brother was safe. Unhurt. He'd been hurt enough, had had to grow up on the streets, lonely, a tiny baby, alone and beaten and begging and Sarp would strangle the next person who touched a hair on that boy's head. He would strangle them and feel nothing.

He can feel his brother vibrating with shakes as they stand back to back, weapons raised. He's scared, of course he is, more so for his mother, that they are in such danger but his residing feeling as he stands staring down the barrel of death with his little brother at his back, is that he feels whole again. He's waited 20 years to have his brother back and here they are. Together. At least if they go down now they're together. He can deal with that. Umut is a physical tangible presence at his side. No longer missing, hiding from Sarp, no longer away from his gaze.

'How's your wound?' He asks, worried. Umut is shaking and he knows his brother, knew him on one level as Mert, knew him before as a baby and in the brief time since he found him again he knows him well enough to know he doesn't frighten easily. That shaking? Blood loss then? Was he lying when he said it wasn't bad?

'It's fine, it's nothing, don't you worry about it' his brother offers. Sarp almost laughs, that's asking the impossible. He's permanently worried about Umut. Ok, then, ok, they will take these bastards down then. Together.

They move as one, guns out, heads turning, twisting around. It's like they recognise parts of one another they shouldn't know. They move.

The bullet rips through his leg and he goes down hard.

It burns.

He grips his brother hard and struggles to breathe for a second and then Umut is screaming at him, eyes wild, grabbing for him 'Get up! Get up!' He hauls Sarp to his feet 'are you ok? Is it your leg?' Sarp lets his brother support him, lets him carry him, examines the younger man for any other injury. Bar the wound to his arm he's ok. He's ok. Thank god.

They move on, staggering like drunks, desperate but unbowed. They will not go down without a fight. The whole world can go to hell if it thinks the Yilmaz brothers will go quietly. 'Rage, rage against the dying of the light' Sarp thinks.

The lights flicker, in, out, his eyes struggle to adjust. There is no way out unless they shoot their way out. Umut is amused by this, it's that hysteria he goes into sometimes that scares Sarp. When he'd seen Mert do that he'd thought him crazy, now its his little brother staring back at him it's even more unnerving. He hates that Umut reaches that unhinged point, that people hurt him so much he snaps like that. _Who hurt you that bad?_ He thinks. As he often does since discovering the truth, that the wild, arrogant, swaggering, bane of his existence was actually his vulnerable, wonderful, broken little brother. He would burn them. He wishes he could burn them for it.

He settles for pulling his brother closer as they amble forward through the darkness. Guns raised. Sarp is so proud. So proud of the man, of the boy, beside him. The way he carries himself, the way he pulled his hair down and shrugged 'eyvallah'. He is strong, he is so strong and so independent and Sarp is overcome with love for him for an instant. What a man his brother was.

Gunshots are upon them and they are ferocious in returning fire, moving as one, together, united, a single being. It's fluid and easy with them how they fall into this seamless weapon. 'I think you'd make a good team' wasn't that what Chief Yusuf had told him? At the time Sarp had been filled with disgust. He wanted no part of the infuriating, crazy man that was Mert Karadag. No thank you. But now he'd take a bullet for that man, he'd do anything for him. Literally _anything_. Sarp angles his arm towards the man currently shooting at them and then it happens.

A split second that feels like a lifetime. Umut jolts. His arm drops from Sarp's waist with the force of it. He's pushed back. Sarp knows. Oh god Sarp knows but he doesn't want to face it. No. No. No. They didn't get him, they didn't get his baby brother.

No.

No.

 _No._

Every nerve ending screams as his brother falls, but Sarp can't grab him, can't do anything,not while bullets are still raining through the air, still a real imminent threat. 'Umut' he screams and shoots at anything in his line of sight. His brother is falling, as if in slow motion and Sarp's chest freezes.

'Sarp you were looking the wrong way'.

Celal. Of course it's Celal. Sarp raises his guns, one on him one on Fulya, both stood before him. Celal has his gun at the ground, but it's not at the ground is it? Not really. It's at Umut's head. Umut who is down, who is rolling slightly, they shot him, they _shot_ him. Sarps vision whites out. _No._

'Umut are you ok? Huh?' He manages when he can get his throat to work. He's not ok. Of course he's not ok but Sarp can not believe that. Won't believe it. Fear grips his heart so completely it feels as if it will jump right out of his chest.

'I've had better days' his brother attempts his trademark sarcasm, but its between gasps and Sarp doesn't want to look at him. He's scared to look down. Instead trains his guns on the two before him. 'How does it look?'

And Sarp has to force himself then. To take in what he never, ever wanted to see. Blood pools on the floor, crimson and growing from his little brother's chest. Umut is curled on his side. He doesn't look down at himself and Sarp gets it. His brash, troublesome, brave little brother is frightened. He needs reassurance, he doesn't want to see. 'It's not bad, it's not bad you're just fine' Sarp lies. It's the easiest lie he's ever told. He can be that for Umut. He can be the protector now. And maybe if he says it enough he can will them both to believe it. It should have been him. Not Umut. He should be the one walking out of here, head up, alive, back to the arms of his mother. That baby deserved to know its mother. They had too many years to catch up on. Three days wasn't enough time. It wasn't enough.

Celal and Fulya are threatening and demanding he drops his weapons. Yeah right. Like he was going to do that. Could he get them both? Could he take both of them out and somehow get he and Umut out of there? Could he give Umut a chance and sacrifice himself in any way? Sarp plays for time. He thinks and thinks, but there's little way he can see of them getting out. Of even one getting out. He's never leaving his brother. So they are both screwed here.

'Abi?' his brother's voice cuts through the haze.

'Say it brother, say it' Sarp whispers.

It chills Sarp how long it takes his brother to get the words out. He's struggling now, he's in serious trouble. He's bleeding out on the floor in front of Sarp and there's not a damned thing he can do about it.

'D-don't you even think about it. Just shoot them both.'

Sarp nods. He will do that. He will. He can feel the slow trickle of blood streaming down his leg, he has a wounded little brother lying at his feet and two guns on them both. He can feel the desperation creeping in.

'Abi…' Umut calls again. Sarp stills. 'Abi, open your eyes…'

Sarp's big brother instincts are screaming, is his brother rambling now? Has death come to steal his mind from him before his body follows. '…No more hide and seek'.

They have been playing that game for way too long now. Umut is as sick of it as Sarp is. It's time that ended, his brother is right.

'No more hesitations' Umut manages, breath faltering as he tries to fix Sarp with his gaze. 'I won't let them take your Umut away again'.

Sarp can't ignore the sting of tears in his eyes. _'Your Umut'_. He was his. His baby brother to protect. His charge. He'd closed his eyes for gods sake. He'd closed them for a moment, just a matter of seconds when he was 7 years old and Umut had been gone. It had been the weight on his shoulders his entire life, the ache in his heart, the hole in his soul, the knife in his gut whenever he let himself feel happiness. He was guilty. His brother had been taken on his watch. He'd lost him. And it had taken 20 years to find him again.

Sarp had never forgiven himself, he would never forgive himself for what they'd all gone through. For Umut's suffering at the hands of Coskun, for the nights, cold and hungry on the street, for his mother's tears, for the nights she slept in his brother's bed and wished it was her who'd been gone. Sarp had been a sad child, and a sad adult because of it. Nobody was taking Umut this time. Nobody.

'I won't…' his brother coughs, 'I won't let you live your whole life with sadness'.

And that was it wasn't it? He had. He would continue to do so if Umut wasn't here. So this ended tonight.

'Go on. Go on Abi'.

Sarp's fingers itch on the triggers. He takes a look down at his brother, the crimson puddle is larger now and the gun aimed at his head, he doesn't imagine will miss but here he is telling Sarp to shoot because he wants to protect him this time.

Sarp has never been prouder in his life.

'Abi'

'Say it brother'.

Umut laughs. 'Let the fastest man win.'

Sarp shoots.

* * * * * *

Black.

Thick, heavy black.

It seems endless and calm.

Awareness comes slowly. His hearing is the first to come back. Everything sounds like a tape playing backwards, garbled and echoey and Sarp is confused about where he is. Then his senses start to return one by one.

He's against the wall. Back to the wall, he's sat down and his left shoulder screams, joining his leg.

Sounds are becoming clearer, gunshots, bang after bang after bang ricocheting.

His eyes take a minute to adjust to the darkness and then he's staring at Fulya's body. Her eyes stare out of her skull straight into his, fixed, unblinking. 'Huh' he thinks.

He's not sure where he is and thinks he should probably move to protect himself from all the gun sounds but he can't seem to bring himself to move. It's like he's been drained of all energy. He feels tired, sleepy, wrong.

'S…Sarp' it's garbled, quiet, barely a whisper but it's the loudest thing Sarp's heard in his entire life. And he jolts into himself. Umut.

 _Umut!_

Umut was down, Umut was hurt. What happened? He fired. He remembers firing. Then nothing. Umut is talking, ok that's good. He's alive to talk.

Sarp shifts. He is aware he's hurt badly here but there's nothing on this planet that would stop him getting to his little brother right now. Not Celal, not bullets, nothing. He rolls onto his knees and manages to shuffle forward toward the heap of his little brother at his feet.

Every inch hurts but his mind is screaming. _Umut._

As he gets to his brother his heart beats its way out of his chest and he reaches for the younger man's face. A face that in the flickering warehouse light looks grey, looks devoid of colour. 'Umut, Umut I'm here' he manages, utter and complete fear laid bare. Why are his eyes closed? He needs to open his eyes. He looks dead otherwise, and Sarp's brain won't compute that. 'it's ok, it's ok, I'm here, open your eyes for me Kardesim'…

Umut doesn't open them but he moves, so he's not dead. Sarp takes a second to move his shaking hand from Umut's hair. Examines his brother for the first time.

It had killed him not to be able to run to him as soon as he'd been shot. To have to stand while his whole world bled out on the floor below him. To have to shoot the occasional glance when he'd wanted nothing more than to hold him and run. Maybe Celal missed. He thinks. Maybe we got lucky for once in our entire lives. But as his eyes sweep over his brother's body he's made violently aware that they've never been lucky people and that they're not going to be this time. either 3 gunshot wounds. 3! Two individual crimson stains are growing ever bigger across his brother's dark shirt. Both to his chest. His left arm is also coated in red. It's difficult to see against his black shirt, the shirt Sarp had helped him pick only hours earlier. He chokes down a sob.

He doesn't know where to start. What to do. How to help. He needs his brother to wake up now though. He focuses his attention back on Umut's face. 'Open them' he begs.

Umut's eyelashes flicker like he's trying really hard to oblige his big brother but they don't open. Instead he manages a word 'A…Abi'. And Sarp would burn the entire world down for this boy. The depth of what that word brings him to. What it does to his heart.

 _Please. Please. Please let him be ok._

He schools himself, smiles automatically at the Abi but the smile vanishes instantly because blood is trailing its way from his brother's mouth now, lots of it. Internal bleeding then and bad from the amount. They need to get out of here. They have to get out or this won't end well. Sarp is terrified. It's always Umut that brings him to that fear.

'Kardesim, I'm here' he offers, hand back on his face. 'I'm here little brother', he attempts reassurance, attempts to put on a front.

'You're ok, you're going to be fine, I promise, I promise you Umut'. His hands are in his hair, on his face, shaking and shaking and Sarp can't stop them. Sarp wants to hold him. He just wants him close to him. If he holds him tight enough maybe he can stop the blood, stop the life leaving his brother, stop all of it.

He sweeps an arm under the younger man without thinking. His other arm screams with the pain. The bullet must still be inside. Worst of all though Umut screams, he screams in such pain that Sarp thinks he might be sick with the guilt. He cradles him in his lap and brings his head down to his brothers. 'I'm sorry, I'm so sorry, I'm so so sorry'. Umut's eyes open just a fraction and they're rolling in his head, he is not hearing Sarp at all.

Sarp hates himself. His own selfish desire to hold his brother and he hurt him, he hurt him, he made things worse. He caused his brother to scream like that.

He is the worst big brother. Umut deserves better.

 _'_ _My brother the lion'_ he'd said when Sarp had given him the spare guns.

Well he wasn't a lion now. He was not a lion now. Sarp's never felt less proud or strong. He feels small and insignificant and helpless and sick.

But then something magical happens. Umut opens his eyes. He opens them fully, and he looks up at him and Sarp remembers that baby, the baby with those big eyes that stared you out. He remembers the toddler that he helped down from the wall, the toddler that trusted him, that held him, that he lost. He remembers Mert Karadag staring down at him in that wood, flashlight in his face, infuriating smirk, but always those eyes. How did he not realise? How did he not recognise those eyes? They cut through a man.

And Sarp remembers all the time he was searching for his brother, how long this game of hide and seek has gone on now.

'There you are' he says.

Umut watches him, he seems out of it, half gone from the pain, but he knows his brother is there. They will get out of here. His brother won't die here. Sarp will make sure of that. Gun shots start up again and Sarp prays to a god he isn't sure he believes in that the police will come through, for once in his entire life, that they'd do something right. He curls himself over his brother, one palm pressed firmly on the bullet wound in his chest, and tells him a story.

'Sarp!'

Could it be? Sarp feels like crying, could the police have actually got Celal? 'Sarp!'

He freezes mid story. Wrenches his eyes from his brother. 'IN HERE!' He screams, body humming with adrenaline, 'WE NEED HELP!' He looks down at his brother. 'HE NEEDS HELP!'

There's a sound of approaching footsteps.

'HELP!'

'What…What happened Abi?' Umut splutters from below him and Sarp is confused. Blood is pouring out of his sibling's mouth with a vengeance now. Oh god. He moves a thumb to wipe it away, doesn't want his brother to taste it although there's no way that's not happening.

'Huh?'

'Did they kill the monster? Did…did they kill it?'

Sarp smiles, eyes only for the boy, the man before him. The police are here. Something is creeping into him, some new feeling he hasn't had much of in his life. It feels like hope. He ducks his head, 'Of course they did little brother'

And then the police arrive. They swarm like flies, they fill the room and they're shouting. Sema and the Chief and Sarp doesn't know where Celal is and right now he doesn't care. Doesn't know if he managed to get him in the gunfire, doesn't know much of anything but his brother.

Someone tries to pull Sarp away from Umut and he screams and fights them and then they have their hands on his brother and their hands on him and it's loud and everything is way too loud and they are trying to take Umut away from him and Sarp can't let that happen and then Umut starts to choke.

'Umut! Umut!' Sarp tries to turn his brother, tries to tilt him to get rid of the blood,

'You found me Abi' his brother manages to spit out as he gasps. 'No…more….hide and seek?'

Sarp makes sure he's looking at him when he promises. 'No more hide and seek'.

Then Umut's eyes roll back.

He's choking and choking and there's so much blood and then there are EMT's and medics and more police and someone is screaming Umut's name over and over again like a prayer, a benediction and it takes Sarp way too long to realise it is him.

He's dying, he's dying, his little brother is dying. How do you survive the loss of that much blood?

They rip open his shirt, the lovely suit they'd brought is cut apart to give them access to his chest and in the electric neon bulbs Sarp is made plainly aware of the extent of the damage to his baby brother's torso. Then they are shoving something into his throat. Shoving needles into his skin. It must be pain relief because Umut instantly goes quiet, floppy, lifeless and still. So still.

People are talking to him.

'Sarp, Sarp! Let us look at you we need to look at your wounds Son' it's the Chief.

Sarp shakes his head. Umut. They need to save Umut.

The tube sticking out of his brother's vulnerable throat looks obscene. It's the most horrifying thing Sarp's ever seen. They are pumping air into his lungs but the bullet holes in his chest are just bubbling over, air going in, air going out. The medics place their hands over them. Hands full of bandages. They soak through with all the red.

'Umut please' Sarp whispers, 'Umut please don't…'

The Chief's hands are on him again, Sarp is still sat a metre from his brother unable to tear his eyes from the horror show in front of him, a medic hovers at his side.

He's violently shaking, he can't stop. Umut's eyes are closed, his chest is ruined, he has a tube in his throat. Sarp throws up everywhere.

He feels himself list. Hears a voice 'blood, he's throwing up blood, we need to move them now!' _Umut_ he thinks but then he realises they're talking about him.

'Don't die'. Sarp prays. 'Don't you die Kardesim'.

And then everything turns to black.


	3. Chapter 3

They leave their mother under the cover of darkness, leave her to Umut's photograph, to mourn a 3 year old that's now a 23 year old stood right in front of Sarp. Umut is shuffling slightly, still winded from Coskun's fake bullet and the first part of their plan against Celal. He nods his head towards the building before them.

Sarp claps his shoulder. His brother's apartment looks entirely different now Sarp knows it belongs to Umut. When he'd been here in the past, to bug the place, to lay in wait for Mert Karadag it had seemed clean, soulless, un-lived in. The home of the enemy, the lions den. Now it stirs a myriad of different emotions in him.

It feels lonely. It feels sad. It doesn't feel like a place that has felt much love.

Sarp's barely stepped through the door after his little brother before he moves and pulls Umut into his arms.

'Oof' his brother lets out, a startled exclamation at being surprise hugged. Then he laughs. Murmurs 'ok big brother' into Sarp's chest. Lets Sarp have a moment and gently pats him back.

When he pulls back, there's a questioning frown on his face, 'So I'd say welcome to my apartment if you hadn't already made yourself welcome without my knowledge before huh?'

Sarp smirks at that. 'Yeah you really need to figure out better security on this place brother. Anybody could get in here.' He throws a wink at his brother, swats him on the shoulder.

'Hmm so I've heard' Umut shoots back. 'Now big brother, I think you need to try my world class coffee making skills'.

'World class huh?'

Umut smirks, runs a hand over his hair. 'World class'. He confirms.

Sarp makes his way to the single couch and throws himself down. 'Better get on it then brother'.

Umut busies himself in the kitchen and Sarp takes a moment to remove his shoes. The place is spotless, sparse, he can spot the furniture sporadically around the place like someone had tried to make it lived in, to give it a soul and he already has a million questions. He throws his shoes in the middle of the floor. Just to make it look alive. Just to give it some clutter.

'Hey!' Umut chastises 'what are you doing with your shoes? You want to put them by the door Abi?'

Sarp fixes him with a look. 'No' he answers. 'You need them there'. Umut looks confused.

'I do?'

Sarp runs his hands over his face and sighs. Does his brother not realise how lonely this place feels? 'How long have you been here?' he asks instead. He'll start small. He'll be gentle with this new found baby brother. The brother he's known his entire life but doesn't even know at all either. Sarp wants to know everything about him.

What was he like when he was fourteen? Who was his first crush? Where has he been? What makes him laugh? Does he have the same pinky finger that bent out like he and his father had? What's his first memory? Who hurt him? (Because you can bet Sarp's making a list of those names.) What does he like to eat? Does he still have that birth mark on his left shoulder?

'Four years' his brother responds stirring the coffee and then he fixes Sarp with a bemused look and nods, starts removing his shirt. Sarp realises he must have asked the last question out loud.

Umut turns around and there it is, the tiny little strawberry cluster of freckles, merged together like a little country. Umut's birth mark. Sarp could cry for yet another confirmation that Mert is Umut, another tangiable, physical representation of the thing he'd always wanted. He could cry but he won't. Because he's filled with sheer, white hot rage so suddenly that he can't breathe.

He flinches, physically flinches back to himself and steps forward, hand outstretched, his brother's lower back is coloured and mottled with old scars. Line after line of what looks like whip marks. Some deeper than others, some more faded but all a permanent reminder of abuse.

Sarp wasn't there.

He hadn't been there to protect him. Look, look what they had done to his baby brother.

He places his fingers on the biggest welt and Umut flinches, jolts like electricity has been shot into him and Sarp wonders just how far these scars run, just how deep the volts go.

The younger man reaches for the shirt, raises it over his head, but Sarp grips his wrist. 'Don't'. Umut stills. Hangs his head like he's ashamed. Sarp's staring at his back, he can't see his face, he's glad though because if his brother was looking at him right now Sarp couldn't hide the tears that are slowly making their way down his cheeks. He examines each welt, each line, so gently with his fingertips. 'Are there any more?' He asks when he's done.

Umut turns, can't meet his eyes. 'Yes'.

'Show me' Sarp whispers.

Umut turns his right bicep around and Sarp feels sick. This one's a knife wound. A KNIFE WOUND?

And Umut still won't look at him.

'I wasn't quick enough, stupid really, I wasn't strong enough to fight him'.

And Sarp gets it now, why the younger man won't look him in the eye, why every single time he took Mert down in a fight he never, ever, stopped, never stayed down. He's ashamed. He's ashamed of himself. He thinks it's his fault.

Sarp moves.

He grips the back of his brother's head. His poor little brother. Oh his poor little brother.

He brings Umut's forehead to his own. Holds his hands in his hair. Forces the man before him to look him in the eyes now.

'You didn't do this Umut' he whispers. Makes sure his brother believes it, or at least tries to. 'This is not your fault, you know that right?'

Umut seems surprised that Sarp isn't judging him, doesn't seem to believe his words. 'I didn't hand over the tissue money, I took a bed, I ran,' he answers so seriously, so serious. 'And the knife…well…'

'What happened with the knife?' Sarp manages.

'Melek tried to run away, they went after her, Coskun did, I...I had to do something…'

Sarp squeezes his eyes shut. He will carve Coskun up in the same way if he ever sees his child abusing, vile face again. He cannot comprehend hurting a child, any child, and especially and above all this child. Sarp wishes he had killed him in that car. Wishes he'd burned him alive.

Umut looks at him then, really looks at him. 'Why are you crying? Don't cry Sarp.' He brings his hands up, uses his thumbs, thumbs away the tears and Sarp sees the child inside his dream, sees that child in front of him, now a man. Still sad, still trying to make his big brother feel better.

Don't give up on me brother.

He never had, he never, ever had and he never will either.

He pulls Umut in to his shoulder, sobs into his hair. 'I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm so sorry. Umut.'

His brother holds him back, 'it's ok big brother, hey it's ok now'.

'It's not ok' Sarp sobs, 'it's so far from ok. They hurt you. They hurt you Umut and I wasn't there, I wasn't there'.

Umut pulls back. He reaches for Sarp's face. Considers what he said for a moment. Sarp can see his mind working, trying to find something to say to make him feel better. Anything?

'Do you know what usually helps in these situations brother?' He asks Sarp, the elder shakes his head. 'Coffee.' Umut offers, and then he smiles at Sarp. Diverts his attention. Turns everything into humour. Sarp knows this trick now he's seen Mert pull it enough times. He will have to work on this with his brother, will have to learn how to get through that wall, past those shutters that he's not aware Umut even knows he puts up. The defence wall when anything gets too painful, too raw. Sarp's still relearning the fabric of his brother. This is a major part of the stitching.

He lets him off this time. Lets it go for now.

'Ok' he offers back 'coffee it is then'.

* * *

Sarp wakes up to frenzied shouting, not the smell of coffee he had been expecting.

He feels sluggish and like he's being weighed down by sandbags. 'Move, move, we need to get a line in'.

Someone has their hands on his face. There's something in his arm. He blinks. A white ceiling.

Blinks again.

A siren.

 _A siren?_

The sound pierces through his consciousness. Loud and unaccommodating.

 _What?_

He jolts upright. Two faces immediately go to push him back down. Sarp instantly switches into fight or flight response and shoves one, hard.

'Stop! Stop!' another voice grips him hard and Sarp suddenly registers he's pushing a paramedic.

He forces his shaking hand to clench, re-controls himself. Raises his other arm in submission. 'ok, ok' he whispers.

He's in an ambulance. An ambulance?

A high pitched beeping has his head snapping across from him.

Oh god Umut.

His brother is lying across from him, prone, the tube still down his throat, one of the paramedics huddled at his side is squeezing the bag. Another is doing something to his chest. Sarp pushes at the medics hovering around him, swings his legs over the bed. He feels woozy but he only has eyes for his brother.

'Umut!'

'Sir you need to lay down' the paramedic nearest to him attempts but he pushes at his arm.

'No, my brother, my brother…'

Now he can make out Umut's face he feels his chest tighten in fear. He's whiter than parchment. Beads of sweat litter his forehead and the only brightness on the lily white skin is the smear of red across his cheek that Sarp imagines came from coughing up all that blood from inside.

'Please, is he ok?' he asks, 'tell me he's ok…'

Umut's hand dangles from the bed obscenely and Sarp reaches out unthinking and holds it. 'Umut?'

The paramedic at Umut's head fixes him with a look 'please stay back, we're trying to help your brother'.

They yell instructions to one another, the one at his brother's chest holds cotton swabs down, they're soaked through in red. Sarp moves his own fingers to the pulse in Umut's wrist, pushes down. He needs to know he's alive. Needs to feel his heart beating because he's looking far too lifeless right now for comfort.

He can't lose him. He can't. He can't live without him now he has him back. Not again.

The pulse flutters weakly. Please. Please. Please. Sarp prays. It'll be his fault if Umut dies on his watch. All his fault. He won't be able to live without him. If he goes now then Sarp goes too.

'My brother take a good look at him, he is a lion.'

Sarp can hear Umut's voice, the love, the respect, the conviction and belief in his big brother as he'd talked back to Celal. They already loved each other so much. He can't lose him. He won't.

The machine's incessant beeping suddenly prolongs into a steady flat monotone and Sarp's own heart stops with it. He knows what that means.

'Move, move, move!' The paramedics shout, they pull Sarp's hand from his brothers 'he's arrested. Start CPR!'

Sarp shakes violently as one of the medics loops his hands and begins chest compressions on his little brother.

'Umut! Umuuuuuut!'

Arms hold him away keep him forcefully held on his own stretcher and he can only watch the horror movie unfolding in front of him. They attach something to his chest and then move away. 'Charging, clear!'

Umut's body arches horrifically from the bed, white and red and unresponsive and Sarp leans over his own bed and vomits all over his feet.

They are trying to bring him back to life. They are trying to start his heart.

Sarp's vision greys. 'Don't let him die' he whispers, people are trying to attend to him, trying to touch his face, move the vomit from him. He can't move. He can't move. He can't look away from his little brother. Can't look away again. He lost him before and it took 20 years to get him back. He can't shut his eyes again. Can't do it again.

'Still nothing'.

Sarp doesn't believe in god. After Umut had been taken he didn't believe in anything anymore. Not himself, his father, any higher power. How could a world where a 3 year old was abducted and possibly murdered have any almighty being if they allowed that sort of evil to happen? But he will do anything now. Anything.

'Please' he offers silently, 'I've never asked for anything, I've never asked for a thing for myself, but please, please don't take my brother away from me now. Not when we've just got him back. He deserves a life, he deserves to know my mother, to live to know what it's like to have a family. Take me, you can take me. Just let him live. Please.'

Umut arches again.

The machine wails, still long and steady. His brother is dying. His brother is dead.

Sarp screams and screams. 'No! No! No Umut!' He reaches for him, reaches like he reached back at the warehouse, arms out, desperate to hold him again. To wrap him in his arms and never let him go. If they were together then the whole entire world could burn. If he had Umut back then they could deal with anything, anything Celal threw at them, anything the world screwed them with, if they were together they'd survive it, they'd get through it.

But they needed to be together, Umut couldn't leave him. Not bleeding out in an ambulance because of that dog Celal and his men. Not because of Sarp, not because Sarp took his eyes off him again and he got shot up by bullets. No he can't go. He can't.

He shoves at the hands again, stumbles off the edge of his stretcher onto his knees by his brothers.

'I don't give you permission little brother' he tells him. 'You do not have my permission to go yet'.

Umut's lips are tinged with blue. They pause to pump air into him and he picks up his brother's hand, brings his bruised knuckles to his lips. Kisses them. Remembers the scars on his back, the way he'd smiled back at the apartment 'coffee?' Remembers the little boy 'it's too high Abi'. Remembers his own voice 'trust me'. Trust me Umut. He caught him back then, caught him off that wall. He'd catch him this time too.

Sarp knows Mert Karadag, he studied with him, everyone knew him as a crazy, stubborn, distracting, liability that did what he wanted. Sarp knows enough about him to know he's a flight risk, an unpredictable whirlwind of a man that never does as he's told. He only hopes that the Umut within Mert might obey his big brother this time. 'Don't go' he whispers. 'Don't go little brother'.

And suddenly Sarp's back a the apartment, days earlier, back in time. A memory, a flash.

'I want to know everything' Sarp had said, after the scars, the coffee, the loneliness, back on that first night. 'I want to know all about my brother. Tell me.'

'I can do better than that abi' Umut had said 'I can show you'.

They'd ended up at a derelict building site at nearly midnight.

'What are we doing here?' Sarp had asked, confused.

Umut had sat down on a step, patted the space next to him and when Sarp had joined him he'd pointed in front of him.

'This big brother, is where I spent my childhood'.

No, Sarp thinks. No.

'Over there under that archway is where I slept most nights' he'd smiled, that smile that wasn't a smile. The wall of Umut was up, his Mert Karadag was showing. 'There were about twelve of us children.'

Sarp had taken in the concrete, the rubble, the wreck. How could a child live like that? How could his brother have slept practically across town from them on rubble while they cried themselves to sleep on his warm bed?

It broke his heart. It physically hurt. 'You…you lived here?'

Umut had nodded. Eyes down. 'I used to imagine you know, I used to imagine having a big brother and him storming in here and rescuing me, he'd knock Coskun out and he'd take me home. I'd daydream about it'.

Sarp hides his face in his hands to stop his brother seeing his tears. Oh how he wishes he could have known. Meanwhile he'd been across town imagining pulling his brother from the arms of a monster, of bringing him back to him and his mother, sitting outside, refusing to go to bed, desperately hoping he'd return.

It was so unfair. How many years had they been longing for one another, mere miles away?

Sarp almost couldn't say it. He didn't want to know, but he needed to. He had to. For his brother's sake. 'What did they do to you Umut? What did they do to you here?'

The wall falters slightly, Mert's sarcasm lingers behind the eyes, he can see it warring to come forward, to make some joking reply, to put his brother's attention elsewhere. Umut surfaces though. And he looks away, staring back into the past, lost in it now. It's the first time Sarp's seen it, seen how far away he is right now. 'Nothing good' the younger man settles on. His fingers tap rhythmically on his knees.

Where are you right now? Sarp thinks. Thinks of beatings, of abuse, of the even darker part of his mind that doesn't want to touch on why grown men have a group of children holed up for years in a place like this. This conversation isn't finished. Not even close.

He leaves it momentarily, unwilling to leave that look of pain on his brother's face, sitting there amongst the wreck of ruins where his brother had spent his childhood, he can sense the sadness in this place. It is ripping him apart inside. He'd take any beating for that child, for the man beside him, he'd take it all. 'I wish…' he manages on a sob, 'Oh Umut I wish…'

Umut puts an arm around him 'shhh, I know. I do too. It's ok though now right?'

He turns to look at Sarp then, hands go to his cheeks 'He came didn't he? My big brother got here in the end. He saved me afterall. Didn't you?'

Sarp's heart grows two sizes. 'I think you might have saved yourself little brother'.

Umut meets his eyes for the longest time. 'No' he whispers. 'No brother, I really didn't'.

You did, Sarp thinks. You are so much braver than you think you are. You did.

And he can now. Save himself that is. Sarp stares at the prone form in front of him, snaps back to the present, wills his brother to fight, to save himself, just one more time now.

'One more time for me' he says. 'One more time Umut.'

He's still flatlining and Sarp's not sure how long a person's heart can stop for but it's way too long now surely. Please Umut. Do it for Mert. He thinks, do it for that little boy that had nobody, that had to fight to survive, do it for that pain in my ass police devrem that wouldn't quit. Do it for that stubborn, strong little boy, do it for him, do it for me, do it for mom, do it for Eylem, do it for Umut.

'We've got him back'. The beeping is back, the monotone ends and Sarp stops holding his breath. He laughs, he bursts into uncontrollable hysterical laughter. Yes, oh thank you, thank you. He shakes and shakes and he can't stop laughing. They inject him with something. Sarp stares at his brother.

Stares until whatever drug makes its way into his system, he passes out with a smile on his face.


	4. Chapter 4

_I'd like to dedicate this chapter to Asayel aka justfiction14 who is such a light to our Icerde twitter gang. She wrote me the sweetest message after my previous chapters and I hope I don't let her and you all down with this one. It's a long one so pull up a cup of Sarp's favourite tea and Mert's coffee and make yourself comfortable. Thank you so much for all the support for this story and for our fandom._

* * *

Sarp's sick of waking up not knowing where he is. It's getting to be a theme he's completely over. His mouth tastes fuzzy like it's full of cotton wool. He swallows. Forces his eyes open.

Someone's holding his hand. 'Umut?' he whispers.

'Sarp, son' his vision clears and the dark blob with a voice quickly transforms into the tearful face of his mother.

'Mom'.

'My son, oh my son.' His mom kisses his hand.

Sarp is more concerned with the tears on her cheeks. 'Umut?'

Eylem appears then, from his other side. 'He's still in surgery' she offers. Her own face is blotchy like she's hardly containing herself and Sarp can still here her panicked voice down the phone.

'Celal! Celal took Umut!'

He'd been so terrified. So utterly sick with the fear that his brother was back in the hands of the man who kidnapped him. He meets Eylem's eyes. 'He shot him, he shot him more than once'.

'He shot you too' his mother answers. 'That monster hurt both of my sons'.

Sarp doesn't care about himself.

'What are they doing to Umut?'

'We don't know much' his Mom offers, 'only that he was critical and that they needed to operate right away.' She swallows, brings a shaking hand to her mouth. 'They made me sign some forms Sarp, to save his life'.

Oh god. He'd thought that heart monitor bleeping back into rhythm meant they would come through this, that there was light again but lying in the bed bandaged torso tightening Sarp feels the familiar terror clawing its way back. They couldn't lose him now. Not after surviving all of this. All of his childhood, all of the fighting with Sarp, with everyone.

'He'll be ok' he lies to his mother, to Eylem, he has a responsibility now to protect them, to shield them from what he himself had witnessed in that ambulance, in that warehouse, his brother bleeding out, his heart stopping before him.

His mom must notice his distant expression. 'My dear one, don't you want to hear about yourself?'

Sarp sighs, settles back into the pillows.

'You had three bullet wounds my darling. One barely missed your artery, it could have killed you Sarp, a fraction to the left. And the one in your side, perforated your kidney. You had serious internal bleeding exasperated by movement. You should have stayed still son.'

Sarp flashes back to dragging himself over to his brother, nothing in this world would have stopped him going to Umut's side. 'Ok mom' he settles for. He hasn't got the energy to fight. He's so tired of fighting, of fighting Celal, his mother, Mert, everyone.

'I'm tired of fighting' he whispers, suddenly exhausted beyond belief.

'What son?'

'Tired…' Sarp manages, the room gets blurrier 'just so tired…'

* * *

'Are you tired?' Sarp asks his brother.

Umut lies on the couch, feet propped in his brother's lap, head against the arm rest. He fixes Sarp with a look. 'Exhausted. You?'

'Completely'.

'You can have my bed if you want' his brother offers, blonde hair ruffled, eyes bleary. 'I'll take the couch'. He suddenly looks all of 8 years old and Sarp can not comprehend how he could possibly have hated that face so much a few days previously. How could he possibly have been mad at this man? His mind is just overloaded, filled with questions and information, fragments of memories. Since the moment Coskun had stepped forward and blown his world to a thousand tiny pieces 'you're Umut, Mert'.

Sarp's never nearly drowned before but he imagines it felt like that. His whole body felt cold, head to toe. Ice took his breath away. Creeping into his veins, he'd been momentarily paralysed. His eyes the only part of him moving, eyes that immediately examined every single mark, every single feature on the man in front of him with those words.

The man he'd been holding two guns to the head of. Mert counteracting him had moved. Hands bringing the guns down. He hadn't looked at Sarp, instead he'd looked straight down. Silent for once, no glib one-liner, then when he had looked up it had been straight at Coskun. He didn't believe it. One mention of Umut's name though, that's always all it had taken to cut Sarp. To freeze him. He, he hadn't been able to look away. Mert couldn't look at him. Sarp couldn't stop looking.

No. No?

Umut?

Mert's nose. Umut had had a little button nose too. Could that be his nose? Could it?

Sarp had scrutinized every single feature. Were those his eyes? They were the same shade of hazel actually now he came to look at them. No. No he couldn't let himself consider that. This wasn't Umut.

'You've been looking for Umut. There's Umut'.

 _There's Umut._

He says it so flippantly like Sarp hasn't spent a year in prison, endless sleepless nights, a thousand tears, the past twenty years of his life looking for that kid.

 _There's Umut._

There's no denying it later. 'You were playing Hide and Seek, you were counting, he was hiding'. Coskun had done it. He'd been the one, the one to take Umut and Sarp had been on his knees in some dirty warehouse staring at the one person he'd spent his entire life looking for.

Umut.

The moment he went down on his knees, the moment he dropped those guns like they were burning their way into his palms, that was the moment any feeling of anger, of hate, of resentment towards Mert, totally vanished. He was consumed. Completely and totally and utterly with love and longing and desperation and the sheer joy of all of it.

And when Mert, sorry Umut, fell to his knees too, stared at Sarp like he was seeing him for the first time.

 _'...or else he'll find you'._

Sarp knew he felt it too.

Felt like they might be the only two people in the world right now. Felt like magnets, that irreversible, tugging need to hold one another. Sarp's hands didn't know what to do with themselves, the need to be close to his brother, to hold him in his arms again after all those years. It had consumed him. It had rendered him a shaky, broken wreck.

Umut was laughing. Hysteria, shock, he was laughing and crying and Sarp saw him then, saw the little boy he'd lost, saw the way he used to hold his head in his hands when he'd laugh at something, that was what he'd always done, what he was doing now. Defence mechanism he thinks. And wants to smash that wall away, move those hands, get past the barrier the way he'd done when he was seven, well now he's twenty seven and there's no way he's letting his brother get away with that wall now.

'Umut?'

His brother freezes, stares, Sarp can see his own emotions mirrored on the face before him. Utter realisation cutting through the bullshit, the emotional maelstrom. 'Abi?'

Sarp wasn't aware you could feel your heart healing itself in a physical manner. Repairing itself, but he swears, _he swears_ , the hole in his chest fills at that one word. All that rawness, all of that hurt, the guilt, the sick, sick dread, it just heals. He called him 'abi'. He'd been so afraid, so, so afraid he'd never hear that again. He feels complete in ways he hasn't since he was seven years old.

They went to school together, how did they go to school together? He asks as much. Turns out Umut aged himself. Of course he did the sneaky, ingenious, tough little creature, because he was on the streets. Christ. _The streets._

Sarp wishes, he wishes so hard that he asked about Mert's life, cared enough to learn a thing about him, maybe he could have realised somehow, some way, the co-incidences would have been too strong to ignore surely. But he hadn't. He hadn't asked.

On the streets.

Umut moves first, he staggers to his feet, hands out and it's all the invitation Sarp needs. They move together. 20 years. Jesus, 20 years since they held each other. Sarp can not believe this. Can't stop the tears. 'Abi'. He's a big brother again.

Umut falls into his arms, his legs give way and Sarp is suddenly caught out with the full weight of his little brother. 'My little brother' he sobs. They fit together, they still fit. Like no time has passed at all.

When he and Umut were little Sarp would tell him stories, stories of monsters, of darkness, he'd improvise, sometimes he'd do the voices. He'd get caught up in the drama, would weave the tales and get lost in his own head until Umut's tiny hands would go around his neck and he'd grip him so hard. 'Abi,no'. And Sarp would hold him, protect him, he'd felt like the strongest person in the world then with his baby brother in his arms, rain beating outside. He never thought he could feel like that again. This time though Sarp's the one being swept up, the one who's being held, the threads of him pulled back together. The monsters are retreating, the darkness dissolving, Sarp has his brother back.

Nothing has ever felt this good. Nothing will ever feel this good again.

Sarp's hand tightens in Umut's hair. He's real. Oh god. He's real. His brother is actually here and not just in a dream, a grown up, physical, real presence. Held in his arms. And he smells like Umut. He still smells like Umut. Sarp takes a deep breath into his brother's neck. It's him. It's him. _It's him right?_

And then he's scared. What if Coskun's lying, if he's somehow tricking him again. What if Umut's dead somewhere, some rotting corpse, still out of Sarp's reach, still gone. What if Mert wasn't Umut after all?

'It's you right?' he manages, desperate, unable to break the hold, unable to ever let this moment go.

 _Please. Please. Please._

'It is me', confirmation. 'It was me'.

Sarp's own knees give out then, there is concrete beneath him and his brother in his arms and there is nothing else but that.

'Hey Sarp' Umut nudges him with his foot. 'Where'd you go brother? Zoning out like that is usually my move.'

Sarp snaps back to the moment. Umut's apartment. 'Sorry' he smiles. 'I'm still getting my head around all of this you know?'

His brother nods. Pushes his hair back behind his ears. 'I do'.

Looking at Umut now. It dawns on Sarp that he is a jigsaw. Some of the pieces are the same, quintessentially Umut Yilmaz, those eyes, that button nose, but other pieces Sarp's seeing for the first time. That defense wall, the scars, the guilt, that haunted look in his eyes when he talks of his past. It's like Sarp's standing in a hall of mirrors and every reflection looks like his brother but each one is distorted, different. Sometimes it's like the entire hall has come crashing down and he's staring at fragments of glass, some of them Umut, some of them Mert, both of them mixed and twisted into the creature before him. Sarp wonders if he'll spend his whole life putting those pieces together.

When he closes his eyes he sees Mert, sees the fire in his eyes, the flinch when Sarp had kicked him out of his own home, his own family, and his heart feels heavy with guilt.

It's not only Umut who feels ashamed. It's not only his brother who's trying to repair himself here. Sarp's always prided himself on his ability to be patient. To ride out the storm. He'd waited 20 years for his brother, but he's so desperate now. So hungry to know him, to learn him.

'What were you like?' he manages, voice quiet, he doesn't want to spook the horse. 'When you were younger I mean? What were you like when you were 5? Or 12 or 18 man?'

Umut takes a breath, looks away, like he's trying to decide which story to offer. Like he's trying to make something up. It's worrying. 'The truth please.' Sarp says, cutting through the shit already.

Hazel eyes meet his own, Umut seems surprised that he knows him already, that he can see through those tells. Sarp congratulates himself on that particular correct jigsaw piece. He's getting there.

'Lonely' Umut offers. And there goes Sarp's heart again.

'When?'

5? 12? 18?

'All of them'.

'You had Melek though right?' swallows, loathes to even mention his name but 'Celal too?'

Umut stares past Sarp, unnervingly far away again now. 'sometimes but nobody could know my connection to Celal' he pauses 'it was always his plan to have me in the police so I couldn't be around him, not like Melek, she lived with him. I kind of had to raise myself'.

Sarp puts a hand on his brother's leg, still resting in his lap, he needs the contact. The thousand yard Umut stare is now firmly fixed on the ceiling. 'Tell me'.

'The first thing I remember, I mean before I remembered Hide and Seek I guess is waking up on the floor, on a building site to a tapping. That damned tapping. I must have been young. I mean I guess four? If I was three when I was kidnapped…' he pauses looks at Sarp for confirmation then, 'I was three right?'

Sarp wants to cry. He had no concept of how old he was. The depth of his brothers total blackout on his identity was becoming clearer hour by hour. 'Yes. Yes little brother. You were three.'

'Ok, three then, I could never get that tapping out of my head, it was Coskun's sort of calling card I guess. He'd tap his ring finger against things. God Sarp I hated that sound. It meant I was in for it. It meant punishment.' He pauses, swallows.

Sarp watches his eyes get lost again. His hands clench and unclench and Sarp's not even sure he's aware he's doing it.

'The first memory I really have is of him hitting me because I couldn't stand up anymore.'

'Couldn't stand up?'

'Yeah, he just forced me to stand for hours at a time sometimes...I just remember being really tired and really little and my legs sort of going and it's the first time I remember being hurt for it I suppose.' The vacant stare continues.

'He had a stick he liked to use to hit us children, it was cold and it was dark and I think I might have cried for someone, maybe mom, maybe you, I don't remember a specific name. He just hit me over and over and then he'd stand me up again and make me stand and every time I went down, I'd get the stick.' He laughs then, and it's so absurd, so god damned absurd in the middle of a story like this. 'It's why I don't ever sleep for long. It's like I'm still waiting to be woken up, like I can't let myself go I guess. I've never been a good sleeper.'

Umut was a good sleeper. Sarp can't see him right now through the blurriness of tears but Umut slept like the dead, he was peaceful and innocent that little child. The thought of Coskun beating him and forcing him awake while he screamed for his brother. It was like someone was ripping Sarp's heart right on out of his chest.

'He'd eventually get bored and let me get a few hours, then he'd shake me awake and he'd bring me to the streets and make me stand on street corners and beg.' He tilts his head, he's somewhere else, back on that street corner maybe. 'Sometimes people felt sorry for me, they'd throw me some change, but most people didn't care. I don't really understand that. I can't Abi. If I see children now…if I see them on the street, I just want to take them and run you know? I just want to run.'

Sarp does know. He knows all too well. He'd actually looked hard at every street kid he'd ever seen since Umut had gone missing. Not just street kids either, any child really, anyone Umut's age, any little blonde head. He'd always hoped, never let himself let him go completely, bloody shirt aside. He'd wonder every time. Could that be his brother? Could he be Umut?

Why hadn't he looked at Mert though? Why hadn't he looked at that blonde head? It's the age thing mainly he concludes. Sarp had just assumed, naively, stupidly, just assumed because how could someone in his year at police school be his baby brother? How could he not have known? Sarp is overcome with a wave of revulsion once more. He was right under his nose, for so long, right at his fingertips, and he'd had no idea. No inkling. He adds that to the long list of things he'll never forgive himself for that involve his brother, underneath, the kidnapping, taking his eyes off him, the abuse he's suffered, running him over, hitting him, letting him be manipulated by Celal for twenty years. If there was an award for brotherly failure then Sarp deserves it hands down.

'Did you have any happy memories?' he tries, wiping at his face, because he doesn't get to cry tears, he doesn't deserve to cry for Umut's lost childhood, not when he took his eyes off him in the first place. Because please, for the love of god, _please_ say Umut had some part of his childhood that didn't break his heart.

Umut meets his eyes finally. He nods. 'Melek. She was my friend. She was my only friend.'

Sarp feels the familiar stab to the heart. He wishes, he wishes so hard Melek had lived to see them united now. 'I've got him' he tells her silently in his head, 'I've got him now Melek, I'll look after him I promise.'

'She was trying to reunite us, that time in the park' he whispers. 'That's why you were there?'

Umut nods. 'yes, she called me, just told me to come there.'

'She told me she'd found my brother, that she was bringing you with her.'

Umut rubs his face with his hands. 'She died for that, for us then.'

Sarp doesn't deny it. 'Yes. I think she did little brother'.

Umut moves, pulls himself up on the couch till his shoulders lean against Sarps, back to the uncomfortable, simple couch. He tilts his head, allows it to come down on Sarp's shoulder. It feels nice. It feels right. It's something Umut would do as a toddler. Sarp brings his own head to rest against his brothers. 'We'll make everyone pay, we'll make everyone who hurt you both pay Umut. I promise.'

He receives a sigh, a nod at his shoulder in return. Sarp brings a hand up, absently plays with his brother's hair. 'You can sleep now. I'm here. Nobody's waking you up anymore. It's ok.'

Umut stills but his head feels a little heavier. He nestles his hair into the crook of Sarp's neck. He acts like he believes him. 'You'll stay right Abi?'

Sarp swallows. The feelings that question brings up. His fingers tangle in blonde hair, 'Forever little brother.'

* * *

Someone is stroking his hair here too. It's his mother. Sarp's eyes open and she's crying, silent tears roll down his mother's cheeks. 'Mom?'

His hands start shaking right away. 'Mom, tell me, he's not…'

Is this the end of his world for a second time? Is Umut lost again but this time forever to them?

'He's out of surgery' Fusun offers. 'I just left them. Eylem's with him'.

Sarp shifts, tries to sit up in the bed. 'Ok. And is he…'

'Critical' his mom offers. 'But alive son, our boy's alive'.

 _Alive._

His eyes squeeze shut. Ok. Sarp can deal with anything as long as he's still that.

'I want to see him'.

'Son, you can't move, you've just got out of surgery yourself.'

'I don't care' Sarp snaps back, and even in the face of the woman he loves more than any woman in this entire world he won't back down about the centre of his world. 'I need to see him Mom. He needs to know I'm here'.

Because there has to be a better image in Sarp's mind than that last image of his brother bleeding in the ambulance, of his hand dropping to the floor, lifeless and alone.

'Son…'

'I'll just go myself if you don't take me. Don't stop me Mom please. I need to see him, don't you get it? Please understand.'

Fusun nods and maybe she's seeing Sarp sitting in that garden with his lantern all those years, waiting on his little brother coming home, maybe she doesn't want to make him wait anymore. Whatever the reason she nods, goes to the side of the room, returns with a wheelchair. 'I thought you might say that Sarp'.

* * *

When he was tiny, storms used to frighten Umut. The loud crash of thunder, the way their room lit up, and he'd haul his little body out of bed and toddle over to Sarps. The first Sarp would know of it was a tiny body wriggling next to him, tangling his little feet with his big brothers. He'd curl into Sarp, his little body shuddering and Sarp's arms would automatically curl around him. He'd tuck his head under his chin and hum some lullaby at him. Sometimes if it was close he'd lean over and wind up Umut's damned music box that he'd never sleep without and they'd both fall asleep to that tune, wrapped up in one another.

Sarp would wake up almost without fail nose to nose with a sleeping toddler. Umut would sleep with his mouth slightly open, curled on his side, pink cheeked and long lashes and total innocence. Sarp would look at him for a long time sometimes, willing him to get up so they could play.

Sarp tries that now.

He reaches onto the hospital bed, curls his palm around his brother's hand. Umut isn't on his side now, he isn't pink cheeked, and he isn't sleeping. He's white as parchment and on his back and has a tube out of his mouth and he definitely isn't sleeping. But he's still his little brother and Sarp knows, he _knows_ that he'll be better with Sarp here now.

The continual hissing and beeping of machines come together like some sort of ugly off key orchestra. Eylem's eyes meet his over the bed. She gives him a watery smile. 'Umut, I'm going to leave you with Sarp for a bit ok?' she leans down, kisses his forehead, 'Aunt Fusun do you want to go grab a tea with me?'

Sarp's mother lets go of the back of his wheelchair. She touches Umut's arm gently and then nods. 'We'll be back for you Sarp, don't tire yourself out son.' She squeezes his shoulder as she leaves.

Sarp is left alone with his brother.

'I'm here now' he tells him, 'I've got you Umut you're ok'.

His brother just lies there and Sarp shuffles himself closer. 'Celal's locked up little brother' he repeats what his mother told him on the way over to Umut's room. 'He's done, he is finally done this time. He can rot in there and think about what he did to us, to you…' Sarp swallows hard. The levels of hatred he feels for that man. For what he did to their family. 'We got him Umut'.

But at what cost?

Sarp hasn't let himself think too much about the future, what will happen to them now? Umut will have to face jailtime and Sarp despises that with every part of his being. Especially since he knows Chief Yusuf, knows he wouldn't have pressed charges, would have let Umut be free, if he knew Mert's story, if he knew who he really was. But Sarp's a cop and he knows debts must be paid. Umut knows it too but the very idea of his little brother separated from them again behind bars, trapped in yet another sort of hell. It sits leaden and dull in Sarp's chest.

Are they enough? Are Fusun, Eylem and Sarp enough to bring Umut back, to keep him fighting because why would anyone want to wake up to face a future in jail? Sarp prays they are. He hopes he's enough. He wants to be.

'Will you wake up and come back to me?' he asks. He stretches in his wheelchair, it hurts, he pulls at what he imagines to be a litany of stitches across his side. Leans down so his head's on his brother's pillow. Nose to cheek again. 'Umut?'

He reaches a hand out and strokes the unruly blonde curls back. The tube connects to the machines on the other side of the bed and his brother's chest rises and falls mechanically in response.

'Fine, ignore me, you love to make your big brother wait don't you? Well know this brother. I'm not letting you go so I'll wait as long as I have to but you come back to me ok?'

The machine hisses.

'Ok?'

Sarp wasn't expecting a response anyway.

* * *

Umut is in an induced coma for 5 days. It's pretty rude of him. The hospital staff remove the ventilator and try to bring him round but he's pretty unresponsive. Sarp gets discharged on day 3 but doesn't really leave. His phone buzzes on the hospital side table and he cancels it yet again. The Chief keeps calling. He wants to give him some sort of award. Sarp doesn't care, he doesn't need it, he's tired and he has an unconscious brother and he doesn't feel worthy. Chief Yusuf died in all of this, Umut nearly died. Sarp doesn't deserve it.

He watches his brother for any change, brings Umut's hand to his lips. Kisses it. 'So I have some news buddy.'

Nothing, no eye flicker, not movement.

'Celal's dead. He hung himself Umut.'

It feels weird saying it aloud. Saying it and believing it. Sarp's seen the autopsy report himself. The Chief had Musa bring it over to the hospital just so Sarp could believe it this time. Sarp doesn't feel particularly relieved by it. He feels pretty cheated really. He was supposed to rot in there. He was supposed to suffer. He was supposed to spend twenty years in purgatory like they had.

At least he doesn't have to stop looking over his shoulder every minute though, at least he doesn't get to touch his brother again. At least Sarp can be slightly less afraid to look away from Umut now.

'You never have to see him again'.

Umut's hand is cold so Sarp closes his other hand around it. Keeps him warm. 'Mom and Eylem are really worried about you. You were right about me before you know? I'm totally jealous, why don't you wake up and make fun of me for it huh? No? Ok I guess it's back to Umut Yilmaz lesson time again then.' The past few days Sarp has taken to schooling his brother on who Umut was.

Mert had no idea where he came from, nothing but a remembrance of being grabbed by Coskun and Sarp wants desperately to change that. So the past days he's taken to talking to his brother non stop about what that child he knew was like, who he was. Sarp needs Umut to wake up so he can fill in the other 20 Mert year gaps, then they'll both know completely who he is.

' _Who are you? Who are you?'_

' _Do you think that's easy to answer? I've been trying to find an answer to that question for years.'_

Well Sarp can help him now.

'So you were about two right? Mom buys us a rabbit. She says she wants to give us something to learn to take care of. So I'm happy right, I love animals and I already know what it's like looking after one animal in particular' Sarp stops and laughs. Subconsciously stroking circles on his brothers hand. 'You on the other hand are just a massive ball of energy, seriously man you were the most hyper little two year old I've ever known and you keep grabbing this poor rabbit by its feet and trying to hug it. Seriously you nearly squeezed the life out of the poor thing.'

The beeping of the machine stays consistent and Sarp nods.

'So one day I'm at school right and I come home and Mom is hysterical and I'm so confused and she's running around looking for something and I go into our room and you're sat on the floor and you look at me and go 'bunny gone Sarp'. Apparently you went and let him out of his pen so he could 'make friends'. We wanted to be angry at you, but you were just so damned sweet Umut. Such a little personality already. Always doing what you thought was best regardless of consequences.'

'Hmmm'

Sarp freezes.

Umut?

His brother's head rolls on the pillow towards him. He murmurs something. Sarp pulls himself up on the edge of the bed, leans closer. Ear to his brother's mouth.

'Umut? Hey? What was that?'

'Am I…' his brother says breathlessly, 'am I getting the blame for something here brother.'

Sarp laughs, can't stop the tears. 'Oh don't you already know it by now little brother?'

He smiles down as Umut's eyes flutter open. 'It's always your fault'.

Umut's eyes meet his, they look a little glazed and Sarp lets him get his bearings. Then they land on Sarp. Instant recognition, calming down. Hazel and big and exactly how he remembered. 'Hi' Umut says.

Sarp brings his forehead down to his brothers. Feels that knot in his stomach unravel. He Breathes. 'Hi.'

* * *

 **Next time on Hide & Seek -** Umut faces jail. Sarp faces Celal's torturous video of his brother.


	5. Chapter 5

The buzzing is getting annoying now. Umut's had enough.

'Abi, would you just get that already? Somebody obviously wants to get ahold of you.'

Sarp shifts in his chair, moves a crutch out of the way so he can lean over to silence it. He looks at the screen and sighs.'The Chief wants to give me some sort of award.'

Umut moves at that, gingerly shifts himself upwards onto the pillow. 'An award?'

'Some sort of honour for finally putting Celal down. Whatever, it's ridiculous. I don't want it.'

Umut rubs at his chin, the IV tugs and he wishes for the millionth time that he was out of this hospital bed. Even prison is preferable to here right now. He's going stir crazy. 'Why don't you want it?'

Sarp is such a funny creature. That this funny creature that he's spent chasing and fighting for months is now his big brother only re-iterates that. He's smart and strong and brave but he has a humility that Umut doesn't know if he shares. He'd always kept up a bravado, a sense of confidence, even if it was an act but Sarp is just different, controlled, humble, kind. Umut is suddenly overcome with being really, really proud of him.

Sarp fixes him with a look, one that Mert knows all too well even after the brief time he's known him as his brother. It's a look that says 'are you kidding me?'

'Why would I want an award' he states, like it's the most obvious thing in the world. 'Chief Yusuf died Umut, there's no major win there'.

Umut's heart drops as it does whenever he thinks of Yusuf, of what happened to him. He feels sick. That look in Yusuf's eye when he looked at him after he'd been shot. He knew he was dying but he still managed to look at Mert like he had disappointed him more than anyone else in his entire life. Umut would never forgive himself for that. For the injustice of Yusuf's death nor for Aslan's. He'd been fighting so hard, making so many dark choices and moves and the whole time, the whole time…he'd been on the wrong side.

The bad guy's side.

How the hell had he ended up as one of the bad guys?

His loyalty had been so firmly in the wrong camp and he knows he'll pay for it someday. Knows no penance not prison, nor being good the rest of his life will ever make up for what he did to them.

It's Yusuf and Aslan that plague his nights, that hover at the edge of his conscious as a permanent reminder of his mistakes. Them and Sarp anyway. He'll never forgive himself for Sarp either. How he treated his Abi. How much pain he caused him, how many times he sabotaged his big brother, how many times he destroyed him discovering their connection.

All because of Celal.

 _Celal._

Umut can't bear to think of him. The stomach wrenching knot of regret. Of how blindly he followed that man. How much he'd loved him for saving him and how utterly and completely he'd been betrayed.

It hurts, it hurts in ways he doubts anybody could ever comprehend. Except maybe Melek who had also been destroyed by that man. It's not like he can talk to her though. Another one on his list of unforgivable regrets. Melek dying to try and help he and Sarp.

He and Melek had given so much for Celal, been so many things to protect him. He thought he'd saved them. He honestly thought this man had saved him from night after night of beatings, from bare feet bleeding and raw from the streets from being totally and completely abandoned. He had believed that. He'd seen him as this martyr. After all, who could love a street kid? Why would anyone help a child who's own family didn't even want him. Who'd only ever known the streets.

And there was Celal Baba, hand outstretched, taking him and Melek away from there. Away from Coskun to a life. Away from that hell. And all along…all along he was the one who'd put them both there.

Who the hell engineered it so they looked like some sort of hero, like the Little Red Riding Hood of the story when they'd been the big bad wolf from the very start?

 _I hate you._ Umut thinks to himself. _I wish you weren't dead, I wish I could go spit on you and tell you you've lost. I wish I had the chance to ask why? I was owed that much._

Instead he's left with a dead supposed father, and a million unanswered questions and a bitter tang of betrayal on that front. But he has his family. He has the best big brother in the universe, one who never, ever let him go. One who spent a year in prison and nights in the garden and faced down danger time and time again for him, just for him.

'You deserve it Sarp. You deserve it more than anyone'.

His brother shakes his head.

Umut tries a different tactic, because he saw Yusuf, saw how dear Sarp was to him in those dying moments. As he'd looked at Mert with such betrayal, he'd only looked at Sarp with love and with pride.

'Yusuf would want you too Abi'.

Sarp's eyes flash, a warning maybe. 'What?'

'I saw him Abi, I saw him in that warehouse, he was so scared for you, so proud of you. He wanted you to finish what you started man, that's what he said. And you did Sarp. You finished what he started. Accept it for him. Accept it for you I don't care which of you but don't for a second think you don't deserve this because you do.' His hand twitches, and he's suddenly exhausted, feeling every stitch and every ache. 'You were the good guys in this story Abi. You were the good guys'.

Sarp ducks his head and Umut can see he's got through to him. It feels like the biggest victory in a long time. This ability to reach his brother. The ability to see through his tells now.

'Besides' he tries for humour 'it might help me in prison to have an award winning police officer big brother watching my back.'

Sarp shoots him a glance. A sad one. 'That's not funny. Your jokes are really not funny man.'

Umut nods and lets his head rest back against the pillow, offers his brother a wry smile. 'I know, you know I'm not really joking though right?'

Sarp nods. 'I know. You won't need me to watch out for you though because I am going to make sure nothing and nobody gets near you before you even get there alright?' He runs a hand over his short hair. 'I'll have you kept in a separate area ok, I will have people on you like a hawk , they'll be watching if anyone goes near you.'

Umut observes his brother as he winds himself into a protective ball. It is such a huge relief to him. To be loved the way Sarp loves him. He's never known a love that doesn't come with demands, with costs, with plotting and owing favours and conditions. Sarp asks for nothing but he gives everything and it's something Umut is still trying to get used to. He keeps thinking about what he can give back in return, what the catch is, but there just isn't one.

There isn't one.

Sarp just loves him.

He wants to protect him and Umut has never felt that in his life before.

Family. He thinks. This is what he'd been chasing his entire life. What he'd wondered about. The selfless loving of people who would die for you and would expect nothing back. He'd die for them in a heartbeat but he'd never quite let himself believe they could love him back that much. Could want to protect him that much.

There aren't words for that.

 _My lion big brother._ He thinks for the millionth time. How lucky I am. Sarp is good to the core. He is kind and fierce and honourable and all of the things Umut wished he could be if he'd found himself on the right side in this ridiculous game. Sure he'd turned things around in the end but he could only hope to be a fraction of the man his brother was.

'You don't need to worry' he offers gently, because Sarp's in big brother mode and even Umut as his little brother can't talk him down from that. ' I can take care of myself'.

'Yeah well you don't have to anymore.'

There's that flutter in his chest again. He's spent his entire life trying to survive, trying to look out for himself, to protect himself. It's such a difference having someone else step in and do it fiercer and harder than he ever had. It amazes him on every single level how easy it had been to melt into Sarp's arms when they'd learned the truth, how easy to defer, to let go, to let somebody else take care of him. With Sarp it had been instant. The second that memory had flooded back. Him behind the wall Coskun at his back. 'or else he'll find you'.

It had been impossible not to love his brother.

Knowing the level of devotion Sarp had for Umut, the level of love, the depths he'd go to and then knowing it was all for _you_ , that _you_ were that child, that this person loved _you_ so completely and so endlessly. It had been instant. Instant love. An instant rush of feelings Mert hadn't known he'd had. It was like he became Umut in that moment, the second he fell into his brother's arms.

Mert stole a book once, he'd gone begging in a library and had come out empty handed for change but had taken a children's book from the table, tried to teach himself to read. He'd given it to Melek and they'd memorised it, word for word, line for line. 'The Velveteen Rabbit' it was called. Mert had never forgotten it. He'd felt very much like that rabbit in Sarp's arms.

" _Real isn't how you are made," said the Skin Horse. "It's a thing that happens to you. When a child loves you for a long, long time, not just to play with, but REALLY loves you, then you become Real."_

That was it. That was what it felt like for Mert. Becoming Umut. Becoming real. Someone loving him, really loving him. It's what he'd never had. It's what he'd always wanted. To belong to someone. To feel real. Sarp made him feel real.

'Thank you' he whispers. Fixing his brother with a hazel stare. 'For protecting me'.

Sarp looks down. 'It's in my dna, always was. I just couldn't find you, didn't realize. Nobody gets to hurt you again ok, ever. Not on my watch. Not in this life.'

It's so funny. Umut believes him. He's spent his entire life distrusting people, locking his heart away, keeping people at a distance because he's never known, never been shown how to trust. People always go away in the end. Everything good in his life goes in the end. Yet he trusts Sarp. He trusts him completely. It's another alien emotion since he found his brother. 'I know' he settles for as a response.

Mert wouldn't have trusted him. And here he goes again, thinking of himself in some sort of split personality. But it's impossible not to. He's finding himself trying to relearn who he is, whilst he learns his brother too. He doesn't want to let go of Mert, he is Mert, how much of him is learned and how much genetic? That old nature/nurture, argument. Mert has kept him alive. Being Mert has enabled his survival at the cost of his soul sometimes but it has. Mert's a survivor, he keeps himself back, he doesn't allow vulnerability. It feels like Umut is taking over and Umut scares him now. He's vulnerable, he has a family, he trusts people for goodness sake. Mert has never been able to do that.

When Celal had held that meat cleaver to his throat and bellowed 'I created you Mert Karadag' he'd wanted to disown Mert, to disrobe and let go of everything that person was, because Mert's whole life had been a lie. He'd been a sheep in wolf's clothing, Umut in Mert's cloak and he hadn't even known it. 'Umut Yilmaz' he'd spat back 'my name is Umut Yilmaz'. It had felt like a betrayal to Mert but a rebirth into his own skin, at the possible end of his life he'd thought 'you never created Umut, you never tainted Umut you pig'. Then the cleaver hadn't come down and slit his throat like he'd been expecting.

Now he's two people, he's two sides to a coin, one he knows inside out but who apparently has never been him and the other he has no idea of but has been him all along. It's fucked up is what it is.

'Where's your head at Umut?' Sarp asks.

And he realises he'd drifted again, fingers tapping subconsciously, he'll have to learn to try and stop that, he can see the pain it brings to Sarp's eyes when he notices it. Knows his brother is ripping himself apart with some sense of misplaced guilt for not being there.

Mert and Umut are vying for a response inside of him. He lets Umut come to the surface and trusts his brother.

'I don't know how to say goodbye to him. To let him go.'

Sarp stiffens.

'Celal?'

Umut laughs. 'hell no' although to be fair that's a whole other maelstrom of emotions he hasn't delved into yet. Sarp cocks his head curiously, observes him like he's a broken bird, cautious, concerned.

'Mert' Umut says. 'I'm not sure how to let go of him, if I even can.'

He doesn't know if he sounds totally crazy but Sarp bless him seems to get it. He nods. 'Ah little brother', he puts a hand reassuringly on Umut's arm. 'Do you have to?'

'Have to what?'

'Let go of him completely?'

Well that's the ten million dollar question isn't it? He's pretty shocked that Sarp's even considering that in light of how the Mert part of Umut almost blew Sarp's brains out a number of times. 'You don't think I should?'

Sarp's quiet for a moment, he brings his hand up, rests his chin in his palm while his other hand rests on Umut, maintaining contact, keeping him grounded. 'I don't think you should', he offers a sad smile, 'Mert's still Umut isn't he? Isn't he just the part that was lied to? The sad little lonely child? Why should you let him go. He's part of you, a major part of you, Mert and Umut _are_ you. You finding out where you came from and who you were doesn't change who you are completely, doesn't make you any less real.'

Umut loves his brother. He loves his brother so much for that.

'I think...' Sarp says with such a serious tone it's impossible not to believe him, 'I think that you need to give Mert a break, stop treating him like some dirty little secret, some part of yourself you're ashamed from. You know what I saw in Mert?'

Umut looks away. 'Someone who threw you off a roof, someone who hurt your family, someone you hated. Someone who did terrible, terrible things to you Sarp?'

Sarp shakes his head 'well absolutely I saw that but I also saw a survivor, this pain in the ass intelligent, fierce individual. This swaggering, arrogant, resourceful person that could get my family to fall in love with him. You drove me crazy. He drove me crazy, because deep down I recognised something in you brother. Strength. You were my fiercest opponent and rival and ok so yeah enemy too because we were similar, don't you think? We were both always one step ahead, trying to fuck with each other, the cat and mouse game of it all. I disliked you because you were the same in a lot of ways. You were a threat.'

Umut feels strange inside at this acceptance of Mert, of that part of him. Sarp's right though isn't he? Mert felt that too. The reason they drove each other so close to madness was entirely because of that jealousy, that threat, that similarity in behaviour, they had never believed it would have come down to genetics but they were two sides of a coin he and Sarp. Destined to be magnetic polar opposites until they discovered the truth.

'You were a threat to me too' he offers, laughs, 'god I was so impressed by you and it made me hate you. How close I thought you were with all of my people. Celal, Melek, man even at the Academy you kicked my ass, you kicked everyone's ass'.

Sarp ducks his head and shakes it, ever the humble one.

'You did' Umut says.

'Yeah well imagine how I felt about you?' Sarp shoots back 'Mert Karadag, my mom's new favourite son, Eylem's soulmate, hell even Chief Yusuf loved you, he was always telling me we'd make a great team' he sighs 'and you kept showing up, getting everywhere, being one step ahead before I even got there, and you were so smug about it too'.

Umut laughs. 'I have to be honest Abi, I really enjoyed arresting you'.

Sarp slaps him on the arm. 'Oh yeah? Which time?'

They laugh. It feels right.

'So?' Sarp asks raising an eyebrow, 'Same team from now on?'

Umut drops his head relieved, 'oh god yes, you are a dangerous enemy to have'. He raises his arm, palm out to his brother.

'To the three of us, you, me and Mert, always being on the same side' Sarp smiles.

Umut laughs. Grips his brother's palm, mindful of his IV.

Sarp stares at him for a beat, suddenly thoughtful, 'Thank you Mert' he says then, looking right at him. 'Thank you for saving my brother. Thank you for being my brother'.

Umut freezes, feels the two parts of himself, coming together, considers how to respond to that, he owes it to Mert to give a Mert response. 'No worries, Devram'.

He claps Sarp on the shoulder. They both laugh.

Sometime later his mom and Eylem arrive. Umut tells Sarp to go home and get some rest but his big brother is still refusing to leave. 'Sarp, go' he says gently. 'You're still recovering yourself man. Go get some rest, I promise I'm not going anywhere. I'm ok now'.

His brother does not look happy about this ruling but he gets a serious look from their mom and finally nods. 'Fine, I need to go speak to the Chief about work anyway'.

'Sarp' their mom admonishes, 'you will go straight home and rest, your brother's right you've barely left here in days'.

Sarp shares a knowing look with Umut. Yeah he isn't going home. To their mom though he just nods. 'I'll see you later then'. He squeezes Umut's hand tightly. 'I'll be back later tonight ok?'

'You don't have to honestly.'

'Umut?'

He freezes then, Sarp has a quiet authority that a person can't ignore.

'I'm coming back, besides I have to beat you at cards anyway after last night's performance, can't have my little brother upstaging me can I?'

Umut laughs. 'No'. Truth is he wants Sarp back more than anything; it's taking everything he has to tell him to go. He just feels safe with Sarp nearby. It's incredible the turnaround in their relationship, he would have happily had the elder man a continent away a few weeks earlier and now he's almost breaking out in a cold sweat at the idea of a few hours without him. 'Ok, rematch later on then?'

Sarp smiles, picks up his crutches. Gets up. 'You've got it Devram!'

* * *

It's nearing dusk as Sarp gets out of the taxi at the police station.

Damned crutches.

He really needs to be able to drive again. He pays the driver and adjusts the crutches under his arms until his leg is firmly off the ground. It still hurts. His side throbs and he reaches into his pocket, carefully balancing himself, palms some pills and dry swallows them. Being shot three times is not fun.

He pictures his brother, choking on his own blood and squeezes his eyes shut for a moment. Reminds himself.

It could have been so much worse. So much worse. They're ok. They're ok.

He makes it into the lift and hobbles his way out onto the floor.

'Sarp!' Sema looks shocked to see him. She comes around from the desk, Musa and Selim behind her both sporting slings. 'Good to see you up and about' she offers.

'Thanks' Sarp tells her, takes in the other two 'we kind of look like the walking wounded here huh?'

Selim laughs and Musa offers a wry shrug. 'A policeman's duty's never done right? How's Mert…' he pauses like he's not sure if he's supposed to ask, like he's confused, 'or Umut right? Sorry.'

It must be weird for them Sarp thinks, they spent months working alongside his little brother, only for him to be an insider, working for the wrong side. He supposes they must feel betrayed somewhat. They clearly don't know how to deal with it all. It's not his concern though and he feels his hackles rise, protective brotherly instincts activated, he won't hear anything said against him. His brother was manipulated and played, a pawn, an unwitting part in a narrative he'd never wanted. 'He's getting there, slowly, it was a close call. Too close.'

They nod sombrely. Sarp can see the mix of conflicting feelings across their faces. He remembers seeing Mert showing up at crime scenes, these three behind him like ducklings to his mama duck. They had obeyed, trusted him. His brother made a great police officer, a natural leader. It was just desperately sad it was all done in the wrong way. His loyalty had been in the wrong side and it had cost him that role, along with a number of other casualties.

'Give him our best' Sema adds surprising him. 'We know what he did in the end. We saw how he helped with Celal. For everything that happened he was our friend you know. Wish him good health from us'.

Musa nods, Selim shifts from foot to foot looking awkward. He's clearly not quite as forgiving as the others. Sarp wonders what went on between his brother and Selim, is suddenly struck with the memory of the way he'd tripped him as he'd tried to go back to the car after Melek's death. He shoots him a warning look. Can't help the big brotherly urge to hit him. He clenches his fist. It's in the past, it's in the past.

'Is the Chief in?' he asks instead, pushes down on the anger. Reins himself in.

Sema nods and he heads to the office, it's an awkwardly hobbling walk and he's unnerved to find people in the office, fellow police officers, falling silent and staring at him in something that looks embarrassingly like awe. He's not comfortable with this. He ducks his head, tries to channel some of his brother's swaggering confidence. Gets to the door. Knocks.

Chief Haluk is up the second Sarp manages the door, hurries around to hold it open for him. 'Sarp! Why didn't you answer your phone son? You didn't need to come down here I could have talked it through with you over that, save you the trouble.'

Sarp shrugs. Suddenly it feels wrong to be in Chief Yusuf's office with another Chief in his chair.

'Chief, I came to tell you that I will accept the award, but on one condition?'

'Go ahead'.

'That it's on Chief Yusuf's behalf only'.

Chief Haluk looks down, nods, then he smiles at Sarp. 'A great idea son'.

Sarp shifts in his chair, the chief's computer email sound chimes and he suddenly darts a glance down at a sheet of paper on the front of his desk. As if remembering it was there. His eyes meet Sarps, and guiltily flash as he tries to move a hand over it. Too late.

On the paper Sarp can make out the dark form of a figure, arms bound, hanging from something, it's near black the image, but Sarp would recognise his brother now he's found him anywhere.

'What's that?'

His hand's darting out before he's even realised. The Chief looks uncomfortable. 'Sarp you don't need to see this'.

'The hell I don't' Sarp responds. 'What is this Chief?'

He's suddenly staring down at the very obvious form of his little brother, head hanging, he looks defiant but scared. Celal has his back to the camera and stands before him. Umut is staring him down. It's obviously the warehouse where Sarp went to get him.

'How did you get a picture of this Sir?' he asks 'What's going on? I thought you said you'd keep me informed of everything involving Celal. This is my family chief.'

The Chief has the good grace to look a little ashamed. 'Sarp you were just recovering yourself and Celal's dead now so I didn't think it was something you needed to see right now.'

Sarp scrubs a hand over his head. 'Chief, he's my brother, I need to see everything'.

The Chief nods. 'Ok then, it's your choice'.

* * *

Sarp's nails dig so hard into his palm they draw blood.

He watches as Celal weaves about in the camera footage with a meat cleaver like some grotesque puppet from a Punch & Judy show.

Umut for his part keeps his head up, tries to maintain that defiant look, the one that's been all over Mert's face since Sarp met him. The look of a survivor, of someone who'd had to fight for everything in their life. To anyone else he looks fierce, unbowed but to Sarp he looks frightened and alone.

He never told him. He never told Sarp this part.

'Tied me up' he'd stated once he'd come round 'he tied me up, talked a good talk and then you showed up and I managed to get free, it was nothing.'

This was _not_ nothing.

Celal stalks towards his brother and Sarp wants to jump into the video and strangle him with his bare hands. The Chief must sense his distress because he puts a hand out to his computer to pause the video. Sarp stops him. 'No. I need to see it.'

The machete rests terrifyingly against his brother's bare, vulnerable throat. 'When you watch this Umut will not be alive anymore'. Celal smirks into the camera, the ultimate pantomime villain. Sarp bites his lip, hard.

'I will make your brother and mother watch this. I will make that girl you wanted to marry watch this. Did you really think you'd get married huh? Did you really think our story would end like that?'

Umut hangs silently. He doesn't react.

'There's no mercy for you anymore. Lets not rush things, lets enjoy this a little.'

'Hands...my hands...if they were lose right now I'd be clapping, I'd be clapping your show.' Umut speaks up and Sarp is insanely proud. Proud of the sarcasm, of the way he shows no weakness, of the way those shoulders stay as high as he can even hung up like some sort of human kebab.

Celal drones on telling his brother how little he means to him. The star of the sick pantomime. It's twisted, it's cruel. His brother is having a front row seat to how evil the man he served most of his life is. 'You don't have a meaning for me anymore Mert Karadag'.

Umut's head rises, he looks Celal in the eye. 'Umut' he says emphatically, 'my name is Umut Yilmaz.'

Sarp can't help it. His eyes fill with tears. They have done every time Umut says his name out loud since they discovered the truth.

'I created you, me! And now I am going to end you.'

Celal pauses suddenly. Umut meets his gaze, he doesn't flinch. He is so unbelievably brave. Then Celal smiles, a sick, twisted smile, 'get him down'. His brother is removed from his hanging place, arms and legs still tied and suddenly he's pinned down and Sarp is greeted with an up close view of his younger brother's attempted decapitation.

He knows. He _knows_ it didn't happen. But he can't stop shaking, he wants to look away but he can't.

For his part Sarp's little brother laughs. Hysteria, mockery, he laughs in the face of death, literally. Sarp is so proud.

'Umut. Die!' Celal screams, raising the cleaver. Then a gunshot echoes through the screen. Sarp knows it's him. He lets out a rush of air, unaware he'd stopped breathing for a moment.

There's a scuffle, his brother moves out of frame and then they're left staring at nothing, noise echoing of ensuing fights off camera.

That was close. That was so, so close. Too close.

Sarp sends an apologetic look at the Chief, grabs the waste-bin and promptly throws up into it.

* * *

Umut taps his hand subconsciously on the bed rail of his hospital bed and he has to force his hand to still. This isn't comfortable.

'Thank you' he manages finally. 'For coming I mean, I wasn't sure you would'.

Sema stands, arms folded at his bedside. She doesn't trust him. He knows that. He deserves that. The merry rings he's been running around Organized Crime for over a year isn't something they can pretend away.

'I was confused when I got your text' his former colleague offers. 'I just saw your brother at the station actually'.

Umut's head snaps up at that. 'Sarp was there? I told him to go...' he runs a hand over his face. 'Never mind. You didn't say anything about me asking to see you right?'

Sema shakes her head. 'No, I would like to know why I'm here though?'

Umut looks her in the eye, matches her unwavering gaze. 'I wanted to know…um I wanted to know what I'm looking at prison wise I guess? And...' he pauses, swallows, 'and most of all, I really wanted to say sorry Sema.'

She looks sceptical, sighs. 'Mert...' then she shakes her head 'sorry force of habit...Umut. I can't just forgive everything you did. You lied to our faces, to Chief Yusuf's, you interfered over and over again,what exactly do you want from me? We trusted you.'

'I know' he whispers back 'I know, and I don't expect your forgiveness Sema, I just had to say it. I had to tell you. I know I lied to you all, I know I was the bad guy Sema but don't think for one second that I enjoyed it ok? Not for one second. Actually I kind of hated myself for starting to like you guys.'

He offers her a sad smile. What might have been? In another life he'd have been good friends with Musa and Sema, even Selim, but he's a traitor to them, a Judas. He deserves that. He deserves their distrust, Aslan and Chief Yusuf haunting his dreams. Sarp forgives him, somehow, someway and that is everything to him but he deserves nobody elses.

'We liked you too, that's why it hurt'. Sema offers. It's not forgiveness, but it's as close to absolution as he's going to get here.

He nods. 'I wanted to know, from you, from someone who can be unbiased. How long do you think I'm going to get? Any inside intel? How many years?'

Sema frowns, she respects that. 'Up to 5. Maybe more if they charge you with aiding and abetting a murder, Aslan I mean...'

Umut freezes. His heart sinks. 'Aslan...I never wanted that Sema, I never would have hurt him, I'd have found a way to keep him quiet but I would never have hurt him'.

There's a part of her that looks like she might believe him. He hopes so.

'So five years then?'

Sema shrugs, 'it could change, the Chief might put in a good word for you. I don't know'.

Umut nods. 'Thanks Sema. Nothing less than I deserve. I appreciate you coming down here'.

Then she does something surprising. She reaches out and squeezes his hand. 'For what it's worth I know you're sorry, I believe you now' she offers.

It's something. It's a lot. Umut swallows down the emotion that rises in his chest. 'Thank you'.

Sema makes her way out and Umut is left alone again. Five years then. If he's lucky. There's a panicked flutter in his chest that wants to run, it's the street kid, it's Mert. It's the survivalist who protects himself at all costs. He can't though. He has a family now, Eylem, mostly he can't let Sarp down. He won't.

He curls on his side and hisses at the pain in his still recovering chest. He deserves this. 'You're a liar Mert' he says out loud.

Umut laughs and then he's not sure if he is laughing anymore, because there are tears making their way down his cheeks.

'This is what you get' he tells himself. 'This is what you get for being the bad guy'.

Nobody answers him.

* * *

 **Authors Note:** Coming up next chapter: - Umut pays a visit to an unlikely person. Sarp's ceremony day dawns and brings a lot of soul searching for both Sarp and Umut. And as Umut begins his jailtime, a prison riot inside brings terror for all.


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes:** Oh my god guys, I am SO sorry for the time delay with this chapter. It's a slightly shorter one here as I wanted to post an Umut head-space interlude. I love you guys. Thank you for each and every single comment and like. I am so happy people are still enjoying icerde out there and my story. It's my therapy because I miss them so much. So to all who have read this, thank you.

Next time: Sarp's ceremony day dawns and brings a lot of soul searching for both Sarp and Umut. And as Umut begins his jailtime, a prison riot inside brings terror for all.

* * *

Umut discharges himself on a Thursday evening. Sarp leaves half an hour before and he has no idea. Umut prefers it this way. He doesn't want fuss, and he needs a little thinking time. Not to mention there's something he really has to do and he knows for all they are a support to him, his family will never understand.

The nurses try to make him stay. He insists he's fine, he'll sign anything they want. He's a street kid, doesn't matter how many times they get knocked down, they always get back up again.

He leaves, the hospital, he walks, he walks. His feet ache. He keeps going. 'You have to keep going Mer…Umut…' he _HAS_ to stop making that mistake. 'You have to' he whispers. He loses track of time, loses track when his legs give out.

He closes his eyes. He opens them. His stitches ache, he feels bruised from head to toe, wrung out. He stares at his fingers furiously, anywhere other than in front of him. He feels stretched too thin, containing all that he was, all that he is, all that he wants to be, it's too much. He is drowning in regret and remorse. And all because of _him_. Because of one man.

Footsteps echo across linoleum and it's crazy that after all these years, all that's happened, he knows instantly that tread, knows it like his own. It used to instil security, trust in him, used to comfort him when everything felt hopeless. Now it's the opposite. He swallows down bile, steadies himself and looks up.

'Hello son'.

When Mert was nine before he was sent away to school Celal taught him to read. He'd struggled on the streets to teach himself. Coskun had no time for children to do anything but beg. Mert would read the back of anything he could, tissue packets, trash, he'd stare and stare at the words, desperately trying to make sense out of them. He and Melek would try and imagine what the words were, try and figure out what it was saying. It was a fruitless task. Nobody was going to teach street kids and none of the other kids showed any inclination towards learning.

When Celal came, when it felt like Mert's life was saved it took him a long time to trust people's motives. Truth was, even with Celal taking them in, he never really truly trusted anyone. He let that wall down brick by brick, inch by inch with Celal. He was a scared little boy, a damaged little boy. He didn't know how to fix himself or even if he could.

So when Celal came to his room one day with a large book in his hand and offered to teach him, Mert looked upon it with his usual world weary childish cynicism.

'I don't know how' he'd muttered. 'I'm too big to learn now'.

'Son, you're never too big to learn and you won't get far without being able to read.'

Mert had mulled that over for a while, he didn't want to stay down, he wanted to survive and if reading meant surviving then he'd be willing to give it a try, for himself and for Celal who he was really starting to let in.

Celal had tugged him in close, had read line after line, his wrinkled finger tracing the cursive, making Mert repeat it, teaching him each letter, each word. They continued it for some time, for almost a year and in that time, in all those hours, Mert let him in, against all his 9 year old judgement, against all his instincts, he let him in. He started to love him. He started to trust him.

And all that time…all that time it was Stockholm syndrome. He was empathising with a man who'd stolen him, who'd broken him and ripped him from a home and a family. He loved that man.

He hates that man. Now he hates that man. He stares across at him. 'Don't call me that, I am not your son'.

Celal's eyes deaden, pierce through him. His eyes always had a way, a way of either making you feel like the most important person in the room (after Celal himself of course, always after the great all powerful Kebab Man) or like a piece of dirt on his shoe. Right now Umut is the latter. 'You're right, I don't consider traitors my son'.

'That's rich', Umut fires back 'coming from the person who betrayed me more than anyone else in the world'.

'Oh grow up child, it was you that wouldn't leave Meleks side. I would have left you with Coskun. You made yourself useful though, I let you into my home, I called you 'son' and this is how you repay me?'

Umut laughs. He draws the attention of other visitors and prisoners, who turn to look at the manic man at the table over. 'Would you stop acting like the victim for one moment you son of a bitch', he slams his hands down on the table, lowers his voice, leans in, 'you took me from my family, you had me beaten and abused and then you made out like you were this saviour', Umut's hands shake on the table and he clenches them into fists. 'One week you're calling me your son, hugging me, and the next you hang me from your ceiling like a kebab and try to carve me into pieces so I have one question for you, the great Celal Duman and then you are dead to me forever.'

Celal leans forward, meets Umut's eyes.

He steels himself,

'Was any of it real?'

The question hangs in the air, an uncomfortable amount of time.

'What you felt for me? The way you acted. Was _any_ of it ever real?' Umut's voice breaks at the end and he hates himself for it but suddenly looking at Celal, feeling that intense pain, those warring feelings, he needs to know. He has to know.

Celal's eyes flash. For the briefest of moments there is a flicker, of guilt maybe, of question, Umut's life with him flashes before his eyes every second of it. Then Celal's stare hardens.

'You were my most useful tool' he growls 'and now my use for you has expired Mert Karadag'.

Umut swallows. He's got his answer; he's got his closure now. 'My name is Umut Yilmaz', he spits back, getting to his feet 'and fuck you from both of us'.

He's half way across the prison floor when the shout echoes back,'You won't be happy with them Mert! I won't let you, you know that right?'

Umut turns back slowly, 'I have people that love me now, that really, genuinely love me. I won't be lost like that again. I won't be played like that ever again. Stay away from my family.'

Celal laughs then. Climbs to his feet. 'And if I don't son? What then?'

Umut levels him with a stare, he learned from this son of a bitch after all, 'I'll be in here soon' he takes a pointed look around the area, 'maybe we'll be cell-mates, maybe you just wait and see what happens if you don't Kebab man.'

Celal looks unnerved for a moment, and Umut blinks, eyelids shut, he wins, he wins.

He wins?

Until he doesn't.

Because when he opens his eyes again Celal is swinging from the ceiling, lifeless, because Celal is dead isn't he? Celal hung himself. He took that closure away, he took those answers.

Umut doesn't win.

Mert doesn't win.

Celal wins.

He is grotesque, like some sort of melted waxwork figure before Umut. He swings, he swings. Umut puts his hands over his eyes. It's not real, it's not real.

But Celal doesn't go and when he dares to look again Aslan is next to him, blood drips from his mouth. The gunshot in his body has made such a gaping hole that Umut can see right through him. 'Why Umut?' He asks.

Celal's body bobs and weaves, his feet twitch. Somebody steps out of the darkness to steady him. 'I had such hopes for you. I had such trust in you'. And Umut's breath leaves his chest.

 _Yusuf._

'You turned out to be such a liar, so wrong son.'

Umut shifts on the balls of his feet 'Chief Yusuf, please you have to bel…'

'Believe you?' Yusuf interrupts, 'that's rich. That's exactly what got me killed Mert Karadag'. He places a hand to his bloodied chest, turns it palm up at him.

Umut freezes. He clasps his hands together. He is ashamed, he is so ashamed. 'If I could swap places with you I would'.

Yusuf moves closer, Umut can almost feel his breath on his neck, 'but you can't, can you son? You can't.'

From behind Yusuf Umut makes out the form of Melek, she looks translucent white, not her usual tan. She looks wrong. 'Was it him though?' she asks 'that is the question'.

Umut feels the tears on his cheeks, can taste the salt of them.

'Why don't you ask him?' she says, a sing song lilt to her voice 'why don't you ask him brother?'

'Ask who?' he thinks.

But there's someone else back there. Celal swings back and forth, back and forth, Yusuf starts laughing, 'Ask him!' Melek sings 'Ask hiiiiim', Aslan joins her 'Ask him, ask him, ask him'. Someone moves forward. Umut feels hot and then cold, filled with the darkest, deepest dread. He shakes his head. Footsteps echo. His palms sweat. The figure is a meter away now and as they emerge from the darkness he is staring at a bandage. The person's face is wrapped, mummified, like a replica of ancient egyptian times. Then slowly, ever so slowly a hand reaches up, begins to unravel the band around the face. Every layer. Umut is sweating all over now. He is shaking and sweating and he is rooted to the spot.

He knows without a doubt that this entity, this creature is by far his worst nightmare, the hardest person to face, the monster of the piece. The unwrapping continues, torturous and slow. Three layers, two layers, hair revealed, skin revealed, eyes revealed and then he stands before him.

He's naked, he's smiling, he's covered in whip marks, burn marks on his skin, and he looks insane, he looks totally and completely insane.

' _Have you got a question for me Umut?'._

Umut went to the circus when he was 7, well he didn't go to the circus he was forced to beg there and he got lost for a while. He found himself wandering into a seemingly unpopulated, deserted warehouse. It hadn't been though. He'd turned and he'd been confronted with a thousand different, creepy versions of himself. He was in a funhouse mirror.

He feels that frozen terror now. Standing before him, staring back at him. It is the broken version of himself. The part of himself he can not face.

It's Mert Karadag.

Mert laughs, he laughs and laughs, his hands are covered in blood, he steps forward, puts his hands around Umut's throat. 'You can't be us both Umut,' he says, hands tightening 'and Mert Karadag survives'.

Umut screams.

Everything disappears.


End file.
